Somali pirates on Tuesday released an Asian chemical tanker they captured five months ago but still held at least 17 other ships as high-seas attacks in 2009 soared to record levels.
Foreign warships have failed to curb the threat on a crucial global maritime route and the world scrambled to find an answer, with Somalia pleading for help to set up its own force and other voices arguing mariners need armed guards.
The MT Stolt Strength, a chemical tanker captured by pirates on November 10, was freed with its crew of 23 Filipinos.
Andrew Mwangura, who heads the East African Seafarers Assistance Programme, said all crew members were safe and added that the ship was headed to the Indian port of Kandla but might call at an African port on the way.
"We don't have all the details but it was released early this morning," he said. "We think that something was paid but we don't know what the amount of the ransom was."
The tanker, which has owners in Japan and the Philippines, had most recently been held not far off the pirate lair of Harardhere.
Little had filtered on ongoing negotiations for its release in recent days, prompting the families of the crew to launch fresh pleas for help from the Filipino authorities.
Norway's Stolt-Nielsen, a leading transporter of bulk liquid chemicals which chartered the ship, confirmed its release in a statement issued in London.
"The company recognises that the safe release of the ship and crew have been a difficult and protracted process for the ship's owners and managers. We are relieved that a safe conclusion to this traumatic situation has been reached."
Manila also confirmed the Philippines-flagged vessel was "now under the command of Captain Abelardo Pacheco, and proceeding to safer waters."
According to a tally compiled by Ecoterra International, an environmentalist NGO which closely monitors illegal activities off the coast of Somalia, at least 17 ships and close to 300 seamen are still in pirate hands.
At least 11 ships have been hijacked by pirates equipped with assault rifles, rockets, grappling hooks and small speedboats since the start of April.
A similar spate of attacks -- including on high-profile targets such as a Saudi supertanker and an arms-laden Ukrainian ship -- in the last months of 2008 had prompted naval powers to dispatch warships to the region.
After a slight dip in piracy in the first month of 2009, favourable weather conditions have allowed the pirates to prove they could adapt their tactics and dodge the international community's growing armada.
The Malaysia-based International Maritime Bureau's (IMB) Piracy Reporting Centre said Tuesday that pirate attacks off Somalia had jumped tenfold in the first three months of the year.
Even before the abrupt surge in piracy in the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden, the IMB said that Somali pirates were responsible for 61 out of the 102 incidents reported worldwide for that period.
"In the majority of incidents, the attackers were heavily armed with guns or knives. Violence against crew members continues to increase," the watchdog said.
In the high-seas cat-and-mouse game, pirates have snatched an ever-growing number of ships in a bid to add to the dozens of millions of dollars they collected in ransom money last year.
Foreign navies have also thwarted dozens of attacks and captured around 200 suspected pirates but an unclear legal framework has led to confusion on how best to deal with them.
The piracy is likely to overshadow an international donors meeting in Brussels Thursday aimed at helping to bring stability to Somalia, whose fledgling transitional government barely controls the capital Mogadishu.
Somali Minister for Planning and International Cooperation Abdirahman Abdishakuur told the US television network Alhurra that his administration needed assistance to create its own anti-piracy tools.
Somali naval forces would "need training and support to be equipped and ready to carry out operations at sea," he said.
On Monday, US Senator Dianne Feinstein argued that all US-flagged ships sailing through danger zones "should be required to have armed security teams aboard."
Source: AFP
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